UNWRA Fires 9 Employees Over Alleged Participation in Hamas’ Oct. 7 Attack on Israel
Philippe Lazzarini, commissioner-general of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) briefs reporters at the UN Headquarters in New York City, US, on Sept. 21, 2023. Photo: John Lamparski/NurPhoto via Reuters Connect
The United Nations has admitted that nine employees of the controversial UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestinian Refugees (UNWRA) have been fired over their alleged involvement in the Hamas terror group’s Oct. 7 attacks on southern Israel.
“For nine people, the evidence was sufficient to conclude that they may have been involved in the seventh of October attacks,” UN spokesperson Farhan Haq announced on Monday.
The UN Office of Internal Oversight Services (OIOS) commissioned an investigation into 19 UNWRA employees who were allegedly involved in the massacre of Oct. 7, when Hamas-led Palestinian terrorists rampaged across southern Israel, murdering 1,200 people and kidnapping 250 hostages to Gaza. The surprise invasion of the Jewish statue launched the ongoing war in Hamas-ruled Gaza, the Palestinian enclave that borders Israel.
The UN investigation connected nine of these individuals to the terrorist attacks. In nine other cases, the agency found the evidence “insufficient to support the staff members’ involvement.”
All nine dismissed staff members were reportedly men.
“For us, any participation in the attacks is a tremendous betrayal of the sort of work that we are supposed to be doing on behalf of the Palestinian people,” Haq said.
Israel has insisted that employees of UNWRA — the UN agency dedicated solely to Palestinian refugees and their descendants — played a key role in executing the Oct. 7 attacks on the Jewish state. In March, Israel claimed that 450 UNWRA members were members of terrorist groups in Gaza. Many countries, including the US, paused funding to UNWRA amid allegations that the agency aided Hamas terrorists.
UNWRA employs 14,000 staff members in Gaza.
Israel Defense Forces (IDF) spokesperson Nadav Shoshani lambasted UNWRA on X/Twitter, accusing its employees of participating in the “raping” of Israelis.
“Nine of your employees might have participated in the largest massacre of Jews since the Holocaust. And no, this isn’t evidence ‘fabricated’ by us. This is straight from the [United Nations] itself,” Shoshandi posted.
“Your ‘relief’ agency has officially stooped to a new level of low, and it is time that the world sees your true face,” Shoshandi added.
UNRWA officials have denied the agency’s complicity in the Oct. 7 massacre and argued their aid work in Gaza is crucial to alleviating the humanitarian crisis in the war-torn enclave.
Israel discovered that Hamas used UNRWA facilities in Gaza, including its schools, to run operations and attacks against Israel and to store weapons, both in and under UNRWA institutions. The Israeli military claims that in the southern Gaza city of Rafah, Hamas terrorists were found in UNRWA’s central logistics compound alongside UN vehicles. A group of 3,000 teachers working in Gaza for UNRWA even praised the Oct. 7 Hamas attack. UNWRA-operated schools in Gaza have also been accused of teaching children antisemitism and hatred of Israel.
In June, more than 100 Israeli victims of the Oct. 7 Hamas terrorist attacks sued UNWRA, alleging that the agency “knowingly provided material support to Hamas in Gaza.”
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